


Back-up Plan

by janonny



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: BAMF!Stiles, M/M, Stiles isn't going to wait to be rescued, hurt/comfort of a sort, little bit questionable who's being comforted, serious conversations to be had
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-16
Updated: 2012-12-16
Packaged: 2017-11-21 06:23:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/594478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janonny/pseuds/janonny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles couldn’t hold up against Gerard’s beating. What were the chances he could hold up against equally crazy kidnappers who were also werewolves?</p><p> </p><p>
  <i>“Look, once upon a time, your Alpha looming would have worked, but not anymore— Okay, it still works a little; just turn down the red eyes. Do we always have to escalate so quickly?” </i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. This is set in the future where Stiles and Scott are in their last year of high school. There are more newly bitten werewolves, but they aren’t ever named or seen, just referenced. 
> 
> 2\. Many thanks to [astro_frog5](http://astro_frog5.livejournal.com/) for proofreading this story and for helping me bend it into better shape. Any mistakes are my own, as I'm prone to obsessive editing, so please feel free to point out any errors.
> 
>    
>  **Please read this chapter's end notes (you can click on 'more notes' below) for complete trigger warnings. They're located at the end, because they're also spoilery for the fic.**

Stiles stormed into the apartment. “Hey, douchewolf. Care to explain why you’re apparently going to negotiate the treaty with the Lancaster pack on your own?”

“I’m not going alone,” corrected Derek, not even bothering to look up from where he was reading about weather conditions — of all things — on his laptop. “I’m going with my pack.”

Stiles was unimpressed. “Yeah. _Your_ pack. What about Scott’s pack, huh?”

Derek finally looked up at him. “We can handle this one on our own.”

“Are you serious?” demanded Stiles. “Are we back to the days of your pack and Scott’s pack bullshit feud? Because that turned out so well the last time, with all the _almost dying_. Do you need me to play a rerun of all that yelling I did to get both of you to see sense?”

“The Lancaster pack hasn’t been a threat so far. We’re just making sure they stay that way,” Derek said, glaring as if he could force Stiles to see things his way by the sheer force of his broody eyebrows.

“Sure, random werewolves from several towns away asking for a treaty out of nowhere are definitely not suspicious. So what’s the real reason you’re going alone?”

Derek stood up and gestured in frustration. “They said they only want to meet with my pack, not Scott's. They probably consider it a threat if all of us went together.”

“And you don’t think that sounds strange when a treaty with Beacon Hills should involve both Beacon Hills' packs?” Stiles gaped.

“ _I_ think it would be better if some of us stayed behind to guard the territory,” said Derek in a low voice, staring at him intently.

Poking him in the chest, Stiles said, “In case you have forgotten, all those times we worked separately instead of together have ended in shit hitting the fan.”

Derek grabbed his finger. “We’re just feeling things out. Why can’t you just sit this one out for once?”

The frustration in Derek’s voice added fuel to Stiles’ irritation. It was completely ridiculous that Derek was frustrated when he was being so frustrating himself. It didn’t help that they were standing so close that Stiles could see Derek’s absurd eyes, with their unreal blend of green and blue and gold. The angry purse of Derek’s lips just served to sharpen his cheekbones and jawline. It drove Stiles crazy that Derek could be this attractive while making shitty leadership decisions, because it was really, really distracting when Stiles needed to be completely focused.

Stiles spoke as he reclaimed his finger, “If I had ‘sat this one out’ for all the other times, Scott would be dead. _You_ would be dead.”

“You’re vastly overestimating your contribution,” Derek said through clenched teeth, leaning closer as if to push his point across.

Stiles jerked back and squeezed his hands into fists. “Yeah? Really? You want me to start listing all the times I— wait, you’re trying to make me angry. What aren’t you telling me?”

Derek leaned in close, broad shoulders boxing Stiles in against a wall; his usual attempt at intimidation when he wanted Stiles to shut up. “Let this one go, Stiles. For once.”

“Look, once upon a time, your Alpha looming would have worked, but not anymore— Okay, it still works a little; just turn down the red eyes. Do we always have to escalate so quickly?” Stiles’ voice came out a little higher than he would have preferred before he widened his stance and glared back as hard as he could despite his lack of glowy eyes and fangs. “The answer is still no. I’m not letting this one go. Tell me the truth or I’m going to get Scott over here and we’ll both hang around, bugging you until you tell us anyway.”

They were locked in a stare, standing so close together that it was almost uncomfortable, and Stiles could feel his heartbeat tripping. He tried to steady his own breath, to stop his cheeks from flushing with heightened adrenaline.

Finally, Derek clenched his jaw — yes, flex those stupidly amazing cheekbones more, asshole — and explained with great reluctance, “I heard of this pack before, from my parents. Back then, they didn’t believe in humans being in packs. If there were any humans born in the pack, they would give them the Bite when they were still babies, even though the chances of dying from the Bite are higher when they’re that young. Maybe they’ve changed, but we shouldn’t take the risk.”

Stiles stared, mouth working soundlessly for a moment. He struggled with this revelation, because that wasn’t what he was expecting at all.

Derek swore softly, “Damnit, Stiles.”

Then he leaned in and kissed Stiles, working at his lips before licking into his mouth. Stiles’ hands instinctively went up to Derek’s shoulders, and he couldn’t help but lean into the hard, familiar body. He kissed back and wrapped an arm around Derek’s back to pull him closer. He shivered as he felt Derek brush his thumb repetitively over his jumping pulse.

Stiles sighed into the kiss, before remembering what they were doing. He shoved Derek away, just enough to break the kiss, because it was obvious that Derek was holding his ground. “You can’t just— You can’t distract me by kissing me! That was one of my ground rules.”

Derek frowned, eyes intense as he stared at Stiles’ mouth. “I wasn’t trying to distract you. If you don’t want to be kissed, you should stop leaving your mouth open; that was one of _my_ ground rules.”

Then Derek was pressing forward and kissing him again, a sharp nip against his lower lip, before pulling back. Stiles realized his mouth had dropped open again, and quickly snapped it close by pursing his lips shut.

“ _Stiles_ ,” Derek groaned, pressing a thumb against Stiles’ upper lip, where it dipped down. “Stop pouting. If you want us to talk, then you need to stop doing that.”

Stiles took a deep breath and pushed a hand against Derek’s chest. “Give me some breathing room then. I can’t think with… all of your cheekbones and stubble and eyes right up in my face.”

Derek allowed himself to be pushed back a step and asked in his most sarcastic tone, “Is this better, your highness?”

“Yes, thank you,” Stiles said smarmily before trying to bring the conversation back on track. “So, right. Crazy werewolves. Why are we even considering a treaty with a bunch of speciesist werewolves?”

“Because we need more friends than enemy.”

“Wow, that’s a change in tune,” Stiles grumbled. “You’re worried they’ll try to change the humans if we went along to the treaty?”

“Possibly, if they think it’d curry our favor. The main point is that when humans are in the mix, these werewolves are unpredictable.”

“Why couldn’t you just tell us this from the start?” Stiles demanded. “Look, if it’s just the humans who can’t go, then you can still benefit from Scott and a couple others going with you. After all, Scott really should be involved in the treaty too. It looks too much like divide and conquer that they want to meet your pack alone.”

Derek glared, which would be more impressive if Stiles didn’t see it so often. “That’s why I didn’t want to tell you this. You’re already coming up with stupid ideas. We can’t leave all the humans behind.”

Stiles crossed his arms. “Yes, because us helpless humans need defending back in our hometown while your pack heads out into dangerous, unknown territory. That makes sense. I’m not even saying that all the werewolves need to go, I’m just saying you could do with more back-up!”

“Why do you always have to be so contrary? We have had danger come to Beacon Hills before and you know it,” Derek said.

Stiles ignored him. “Can you just stop for a moment and discuss this with Scott?”

“Why? This is the best decision.”

“Hello, _you_ think it’s the best decision. That doesn’t make it true. You hate it when we go off on our own without talking to you, and you know that Scott hates it when you do the same to us. So just hold your horses for now. Rather than run out of Beacon Hills right this moment, talk to Scott first, okay? I don’t need World War Wolf number ten, here.”

He shouldered past Derek with a huff. He had to go now before Derek cornered him and argued some more, which would result in angry sex against a wall or kitchen table. Angry sex with all that aggressive manhandling and clothes mostly still on could be so very good, but it also meant that Derek wouldn’t be seriously thinking about what Stiles had just said. Stiles knew this from incredibly arousing and annoying experience.

“I’m not going to hold off on an entire treaty just because you ask me to,” said Derek. It was like he knew the exact most irritating thing to say.

Stiles yelled back over his shoulder, “When do you ever do anything just because I ask you to? For once in your life, do this because it’s the most logical next step!”

He rushed down the apartment stairs and back into his Jeep with no further comments from Derek. This casual sex deal he had with Derek had a lot of potential to cause upheaval, but Stiles was determined that whatever dynamic they had before wouldn’t be changed by what they got up to in bed. And outside of bed sometimes, to be honest.

He didn’t know if any of his argument got through Derek’s thick skull this time, but he had done his best on such short notice. If appealing to his logic didn’t work, Stiles would need someone else to metaphorically shake some sense into Derek.

Stiles called Scott at the first set of lights to impart the latest news with a generous helping of grumpy snark at Derek’s stubbornness.

“You want to come over and play some Modern Warfare later?” Scott offered, after sighing and agreeing that he would go talk to Derek. 

Stiles knew it was an attempt to soothe his anger, and any other day, he would have accepted it. “Nah, not today. My fridge is echoing in its emptiness, and I need to stock up before my dad uses it as an excuse to eat all sorts of junk.”

Since Stiles couldn’t cook much, he always kept the kitchen filled with healthy snacks and tried to be in charge of all their bought meals.

“Okay then. Don’t speed while angry driving,” said Scott, slightly amused.

“The Sherriff’s law-abiding son would never drive recklessly,” Stiles said in mock horror.

Scott laughed. “The Sherriff must have two sons then.”

Stiles hissed, “There can only be one.”

He ended the call in a much better mood, driving towards the grocery store.

# # # # # # # # # #

Stiles should have known that good moods weren’t meant to last in Beacon Hills, because he found himself confronted with a pack of unknown werewolves while he was loading his newly-bought groceries into his Jeep. Considering everything that was going on, Stiles had a suspicion that he was being introduced to the Lancaster werewolves and that the treaty was just a front to get half the werewolves out of Beacon Hills. _Of course_. That would be just his luck, because knowing Derek, he would have left already rather than talk to Scott. Or worse, Stiles’ advice would have worked and Scott had left with Derek as well.

He didn’t have time to think about it much, though, because he was quickly taken at claw-point and forced into his Jeep. The werewolves were smart. The grocery store’s car-park had been deserted, and they made Stiles drive to the fringe of Beacon Hills, where they abandoned his Jeep, before switching to a waiting car and driving him to an old, empty house at the other side of town. Now his back was getting acquainted with the old house’s living room wall as the Alpha pinned him there.

“Aren’t you just adorable?” she said, grinning at him through her sharp teeth.

While Stiles was usually happy to take any compliment directed his way, he drew the line at being pawed at by crazy werewolf kidnappers. He had _standards_ , damnit. He held himself still so as not to flinch away from the woman pinning him against the wall.

“You should see me under natural sunlight. Much, much cuter then. This dim, horror-movie-ish lighting just isn’t doing much for my cheekbones,” said Stiles.

The hand that was trailing down Stiles’ chest came back up and pressed firmly against his throat. Stiles moved his head back, but there wasn’t anywhere else to go. He tried not to shake at the feeling of sharp claws against his fragile skin. Unlike Peter the great undead, there would be no resurrection in Stiles’ future if they ripped out his throat. 

“I can see you just fine,” she said, her dark eyes flaring red as she spoke.

“Good for you,” Stiles said. “So was that all?”

She laughed, leaning close to breathe against his ear, “We’re not done with you yet, _Stiles_. Far from it.”

Fuck, they knew his name. So it wasn’t just a random kidnapping, or even that the Lancaster werewolves were picking random humans who smelled like other wolves, though he’d known that would be a slim chance. This meant they needed something from him specifically, which wasn’t good at all.

Stiles glared at her. “What do you want?”

She bared her teeth in a parody of a smile. “So many things. And you’re going to give it all to us, aren’t you? You’re going to tell us _everything_.”

Stiles imagined her teeth sinking into his throat, and let the thought kick his fear up a notch, heart thrumming like a hummingbird as he said, “What do you want exactly? You can’t really think that they tell me the important stuff? I don’t _know_ anything.”

It was something he had learned from his time with all the werewolves. You could lie to them by obfuscation, and if your heartbeat was already going fast enough, it was difficult for them to hear a lie.

“Things are going to get very messy if you really don’t know anything,” the other werewolf behind her commented, speaking in an almost Texan drawl. “Messy for you anyway, human.”

“Oh, he knows. He’s the smart one in this little pack. There’s no way he would be out of the loop with what’s going on here,” said the woman.

“But will he know how to make a kanima?”

It was a good thing Stiles’ heartbeat was already all over the place with anxiety, otherwise he would have probably given it all away with his heart doing some wacky samba beat. Because he did know about kanimas, having had front row seats to the clusterfuck of Jackson going all scaly before turning werewolf at the end of it all.

“How to make one? Aren’t they just another beastie? Why would you want to make one anyway?” Stiles asked, trying to stall for time.

The henchman at the back grinned. “We don’t want to make one. We want to make an _army_.”

The woman elaborated with fanged glee, “Not an army in their fledgling form, but in their full winged majesty. Our pack will be unstoppable after that, any town would be ours for the picking. Imagine other packs or hunters trying to take us down. We would massacre them.”

An army of kanimas. An army of kanimas in the monstrous winged form that Peter had showed them on his laptop after everything had gone down. Some of his horror must have come through, because his kidnappers looked intrigued.

The Alpha tilted her head in a disturbingly canine fashion. “How about you tell us, little bird? If you sing sooner, we’ll be able to let you go before we have to hurt you too much.”

“Sorry, I don’t sing to an audience of less than a thousand. Manager’s advice. Have to preserve the golden pipes,” Stiles said with a lightness he didn’t feel.

“His reaction to fear and danger is strange,” the werewolf behind her commented idly.

“Maybe we need to ramp up his fear until his survival instincts kick in,” said the woman with distant curiosity. Her other hand wrapped around his arm and squeezed down. “Don’t worry, we’ll stay away from your ‘golden pipes’. But the other parts of you are fair game, aren’t they?”

Stiles curled in on his arm with a yelp of surprise, before groaning deeply when he felt sharp pain dig into his skin and flesh. He scrabbled at her wrist with his other hand, but she only squeezed down harder. He cried out, feeling her claws slice deep into his arm. She let out a satisfied chuckle as she pulled her fingers out. Stiles felt his stomach turn and bile rise to his throat at the squelch her claws and fingertips made as they pulled out of his flesh.

She licked her claws and smiled. “Fresh meat. How delicious… Will you sing now?”

Stiles took several deep, shaky breaths, his body trembling with pain and fear. Then he warbled out, “ _Sing it for the boys, sing it for the girls! Every time that you lose it, sing it for the world—”_

# # # # # # # # # #

Really? My Chemical Romance? That was the best comeback he had when facing off clichéd werewolf villains? God, his brain really didn’t work normally under pressure.

He touched his sore cheek where the Alpha had backhanded him, and pushed himself up against the door they had locked behind him. This was starting to feel familiar in a Gerard Argent type of way, which he really didn’t appreciate. But the comparisons were undeniable, and Stiles had to face up to reality. He was back in a position where someone wanted something from him, and they were willing to use violence to get it.

This was a very, very bad thing, because experience had proven that Stiles didn’t cope well with pain and had no defense against it. Worse yet, these werewolves had more in their arsenal than just fists. Much more. They had claws and fangs and inhuman strength. Stiles knew when they buckled down to hurt him, he wouldn’t be holding anything back. He would tell them everything. And once he did, he would be dead.

Gerard had let him go as a message, had hurt Stiles to get to Scott. But these werewolves wouldn’t have the same motivation or restraint. As soon as Stiles spilled the beans, he would be worthless to them. His dead, strung-up body would be a loud enough message.

Stiles’ hands shook at the thought as he started exploring his prison, feeling the door for any flaws or give. He moved further into the room, looking at the place where he was being held captive, just for something to do while he worked through his agitation. It looked like he was in a spacious attic. They had shoved him up a flight of stairs before locking him in here. The place had a few boxes and old furniture stacked up, everything covered in a thick layer of dust except for where things had been moved around recently. The old cabinet and desk had obviously been ransacked, which might mean that the werewolves had done a cursory check to ensure they weren’t leaving him with any weapons. That was bad. They weren’t underestimating Stiles entirely.

Stiles started looking through the old stuff anyway, hoping against hope for something that would strike him with inspiration to get him out of here. Not that he would be able to get far with more than a dozen werewolves close on his heel.

He gritted his teeth against the depressing thought and started with the cabinet beside the door.

Shifting through stacks of old paper and journals, Stiles let his jittering brain take stock of his situation. The werewolves had picked a boarded-up house that was far away enough from town that no one would notice the sudden presence of a large group of people. There would hardly be anyone around this place. If they really were the Lancaster pack, then this was premeditated and everything was planned. Meanwhile, Derek and Scott’s packs were still clueless about the presence of intruders in Beacon Hills.

Stiles swung around and punched the wooden wall, ignoring the sharp pain that shot up his knuckles. “Think, damnit, _think_. You have to get out of this. You have to think of a way, because if you don’t…”

He would be dead.

Stiles pressed his bruised hand to his stomach. No one was coming to rescue him, because no one even knew he was missing. It would be night, maybe early morning before his dad came home from work. Depending on how tired his dad was, he might just assume Stiles’ missing Jeep in front of the house just meant that Stiles was sleeping over at Scott’s. He did it often enough. Stiles had no plans with the rest of the pack this weekend, so it would be entirely normal for him not to see any of them at all. None of them had an inkling that danger was brewing again. No one would be alert for any strange werewolves or checking in on Stiles.

Even if his dad realized he was missing when he came home, that still meant that Stiles was going to be in the Lancaster werewolves’ hands for a whole day. That was a lot of hours to work up to all sorts of fun torture.

He tried not to over-think the ‘fun torture’ bit, but his brain was already in overdrive about what the werewolves would do to him, about how he would give away all that he knew about kanimas and how to make them from bitten humans with unresolved, identity issues. But no matter how much he told them, these werewolves would never be able to truly control an army of kanimas. In the end, no one really could once they had rampaged for too long. An army of out of control kanimas would mean casualties, astronomical numbers of dead and maimed people. His dad would try to stop them because his dad was the sheriff, but his dad didn’t know about supernatural creatures. He wouldn’t stand a chance even if he did.

Stiles knew he could never help this pack achieve what they wanted, not if he wanted to keep everyone safe. But left in their hands all day, he wouldn’t have a choice on that matter.

He searched faster, moving away from the cabinet to scramble over the furniture and junk in the room. He headed towards the dustier things, figuring that the werewolves hadn’t looked too closely at those yet. So far, he wasn’t getting much of anything.

The Alpha had told him that they would drop in to ‘check on him’ in an hour. Stiles knew it was a typical scare tactic. Give him time to stew, to think up all the horrible things that they would do to him, the anticipation serving to heighten the torture.

Too bad it was working so well.

# # # # # # # # # #

They came for him again, and he went with them, because he wasn’t ready yet to think about his last resort. He had tried to look for other things he could use even after going over the room twice, and trying to find a way to pry off the bars on the small window. He was desperate and scared, but he couldn’t seriously entertain the options he had come up with so far.

Now, his body ached. He curled his arms over his head as the werewolves kicked him in the side and back, laughing as they took turns giving him a heavy kick or stomping on him. They weren’t using their full strength, he knew, or he would already be dead. Instead, they were just toying with him, hitting him to hear him groan and see him cower. Stiles thought that Hell must be like this, surrounded by looming, laughing figures, their shadows mutated in the candle light. He tried to ignore his body, squeeze his eyes shut and concentrate on the cold floor instead. He thought about the rough floor and the house. The whole house was cold and dark except for the lit candles. There was probably no electricity in here since no one lived here for awhile. Stiles wondered who owned this place, who would find the splatters of his blood on the floor when they came back to their wrecked house.

He was yanked up from the ground by his shirt.

“Ready to talk yet, little bird?” asked one of the werewolves. The Alpha wasn’t around, and all their faces were starting to blur to his eyes.

“Sure, sure. Always ready to talk,” Stiles slurred. “What did you want to talk about? Beacon Hills’ fine examples of the American Foursquare houses? Can’t believe this one is still standing, how old must it be? I didn’t think we had anything made of wood anymore.”

He cried out as claws dug into his shoulders. They sank in deep, and he kicked instinctively, trying to get away from the pain. But it was like kicking a brick wall, and the sharp pain only intensified. Then the werewolf pulled his claws out, leaving Stiles to gasp wetly, struggling to stay on his feet.

“Yum,” said the werewolf, inspecting the blood on his claws.

His eyes gleamed gold as he picked up Stiles’ hand and brought it close his lengthening fangs. “Maria said we should leave maiming for later. But when she gets back, I’m going to ask if I can have a nibble. Just a finger or two. Or maybe all of them. Surely that doesn’t count as maiming? You don’t need your fingers to sing, do you?”

Stiles let out a choked cry, shoving away so hard that he smashed against the table with all the lit candles. The candles and papers went flying, and the werewolves swore, rushing around to put out the candles rolling on the floor. One of the werewolves grabbed him and hit him in the back of his head. He lay against the table, dazed, hands groping sightlessly. Then he was hauled to his feet and shoved up the stairs again.

# # # # # # # # # #

Stiles gasped and shook in a corner of the attic, curled up with his knees pulled to his chest and his face buried in his arms.

Biting off his body parts. _His fingers_. Stiles squeezed his hands together, fingers feeling weak at the thought of the werewolf biting them off. All of them. Stiles choked down a scream of terror.

There was no more time. He couldn’t be a coward anymore, because he knew that if they came in a second time and… did what they said they would, he wouldn’t be able to keep any secrets from them. Experience had proven that true, even when Gerard didn’t have time to get creative. All these werewolves had was time. And a human to play with.

Stiles couldn’t be brave with them. He couldn’t be brave in the face of torture, he wasn’t strong enough. But he could be brave in here alone.

Stiles dug out the package he had found, lying squashed under a musty cushion. It was a plastic pack, opened and with half of the squarish brown pellets gone. On the front, there was a picture of a rat, lying on its back and a warning against ingestion by pets or humans. Stiles hands shook as he poured out a few pellets onto his open palm.

Rat poison wasn’t the fastest, most effective way to go. But Stiles didn’t think he could go through with any other way. He had considered the window, breaking the glass and using it to open a vein. But if he didn’t do it right, the spilled blood would attract the werewolves before he was dead, and then he wouldn’t have a second chance at this. Staking himself in the chest had the same problem, and the truth was that he probably would miss his heart or he wouldn’t be able to make a wooden leg from the chair or desk sharp enough to finish the act.

The safest bet was rat poison. He couldn’t remember which type did what, but he knew the most common was an anticoagulant, and it worked by causing internal bleeding. He had remembered reading an article about a suicide case, and it had sounded slow and painful. But he was desperate now. If he took enough, it should work faster. His fingers shook as he picked out a couple pellets.

He chewed and swallowed the first one, not even tasting anything through his shocked daze.

Stiles’ biggest regret would be that his dad would have no idea what really happened, what caused the distance between them and the reason for this final, horrible ending. Stiles always thought he would have the time to fix things with his dad when everything calmed down. But he was shit out of luck, and it was his own fault. His poor, poor dad. He couldn’t imagine how his dad would take this, finding out how Stiles had died, how he would be going home alone, to an empty house with echoes of a dead wife and son…

Stiles had to stop thinking about his dad, or he would stop doing what needed to be done now.

He spared a moment’s thought for his friends, because he owed them that much. Scott, his reckless best friend who didn’t always know what he was doing, but always had his heart in the right place. He hoped Scott kept safe, he hoped someone helped him through the shitstorm that was a werewolf’s life. And there was Lydia, one of his good friends now, after all his time spent pining. She would always be his favorite girl, smart and beautiful as she was, even after he had let go of his crush on her once he started up with Derek instead.

God, in this desperate moment on his own, Stiles could admit to himself that maybe his relationship with Derek could have been more than just casual. The intensity between them, their constant push-pull that worked so well sometimes. Fuck, Stiles hoped that Derek wouldn’t blame himself for this, because Derek was great at finding ridiculous ways to shoulder the guilt for everything. If only Stiles had more time to sort out things between them.

But what was one more regret to add to a long list? He wouldn’t go to college, he wouldn’t see his best friend get married, he wouldn’t hug his dad again…

Stiles finished the last pellet, crumpling up the empty package. His throat felt dry and sore, while his stomach roiled. He didn’t know how long it would take, after eating so many. But his fate was sealed in any case. It was almost freeing. Even if the werewolves came in for another round before he was dead, he knew the final outcome of it all. There was nothing more permanent that they could threaten him with than death.

That didn’t mean he still couldn’t be tortured of course. But it was fine. Ultimately, rat poison was Plan B, in case Plan A didn’t work. Stiles was going to die, but he wasn’t going to go alone. He would take down a couple werewolves with him at the very least, and give them something else to think about rather than picking on the weak human.

He took a deep breath and moved towards the back of the room, looking for the old heater he had seen earlier. It was going to come in handy.

# # # # # # # # # #

Stiles was starting to feel nauseated and dizzy when he heard a crick on the stairs. He had no idea if it was all in his head from the stress of the situation or if the rat poison really was working already. He had no way to track the time — they had taken his phone, and he wasn’t wearing a watch — but it was probably time for another round of torture.

Well, if they were going to come get him, they needed to come in fast for his plan to work. So Stiles smashed at the wall with a leg he had broken off from the old desk. Then he screamed, before darting into place beside the cabinet by the door.

As expected, the footsteps coming up the stairs suddenly sped up. Then the door was being shoved inwards, which was perfect, because attached to the doorknob was a long string of wool Stiles had unraveled from his sweater. The thread tugged hard on the pail that was balanced on top of the cabinet. It was tilted towards the door, propped in place by books, and at the hard yank by the string, the pail toppled all the way off the cabinet towards the inside of the doorway. Its contents spilled over the werewolf who had just barged in, even as the pail whacked him in the shoulder.

He froze, probably not identifying yet that he was covered from shoulders to knee in gasoline that Stiles had extracted from the old heater’s tank.

Stepping out from beside the cabinet, Stiles threw several clumps of paper that he had lit on fire at the werewolf. A couple missed, but the others hit the werewolf in the chest.

He went up in flames.

Stiles leapt back from the sudden heat and the screaming werewolf. He held the broken desk leg in front of him to attempt to fend off the werewolf in case he came forward, but the burning werewolf was screaming and stumbling backwards. He took one more step back, and was suddenly pitching down the staircase.

The werewolf’s screams were joined by another, higher pitched screaming, before it morphed into a roar. Holy shit, was that the Alpha? If she had been coming up the stairs, then the first werewolf would have slammed right into her, and the fire could have caught. This was better than Stiles expected.

Holding his makeshift weapon tighter, Stiles pocketed the lighter even as he braced for more werewolves to come charging upstairs. It was a good thing Stiles had managed to get the lighter. He’d seen it on the table when they’d brought him downstairs for the first round of beating, and injured as he was, Stiles had aimed himself at the table for the sole purpose of palming it. The move had paid off. It would have been terrible if he had tried to start a fire using lessons from his Boy Scout days, especially since he had been kicked out of the Boy Scouts for not paying attention.

Plan A was working much better than he expected.

The scattered piles of papers that Stiles had arranged in front of the door were on fire as well, which had been his aim. Smoke inhalation was a much faster and surer way to go than rat poison, and in such a small, enclosed room, it might not be far off. Hopefully, it happened before the fire spread to him, because he didn’t relish the idea of going the same way as that werewolf and most of Derek’s family. Fuck, this was going to suck so bad for Derek.

What Stiles hadn’t expected was for the staircase to be burning as well, and how quickly the fire was spreading. There was a lot of wood in this house, but he hadn’t realized how quickly it would all go up. The doorframe was on fire, spreading to the walls. The floor was definitely on fire, and he was surprised that it was burning so quickly as well. He had worried that the werewolves might charge through a burning door to get to him, depending on how much they wanted the information he had. It was hard to predict people who could heal faster than normal. But there would be no charging into the room via the staircase if the staircase was gone. Stiles slumped into an old rocking chair. Looked like he didn’t need the rat poison after all.

If he was lucky, the whole house would burn down. Maybe it would take a few other werewolves with it. Regardless, his pack would be alerted to the fact that something was wrong. Maybe his dad wouldn’t have to find out about the rat poison, wouldn’t have to think that Stiles was depressed and he didn’t notice.

There went the cabinet. All that paper and dust was probably delicious food to the growing fire. Wow, Stiles was anthropomorphizing the fire now. Not a good sign of mental stability. Maybe he could blame it on smoke inhalation. The room was starting to fill up with thick gray smoke, and Stiles’ eyes were stinging. Breathing was getting a little difficult, but worst of all, the fire was spreading quickly through the floor. Stiles rocked in the chair, gripping the arms, and closed his eyes. He tried to ignore the heat from the growing fire, tried to breathe slowly and stay calm. The floor would probably collapse soon. He hoped he went quickly. He hoped he didn’t burn for too long.

Stiles sent a mental apology to his dad, to Scott, to Derek, to—

A loud, rending sound reached his ears, along with the smash of breaking glass. Stiles’ eyes flew open and he turned to see the entire window frame, bars and broken glass and wood, being ripped out of the wall. Then Scott swung into the room. A screaming roar accompanied by howls echoed chillingly from downstairs.

Reinforcements were here. Stiles was paralyzed with relief, body practically weakened by the thought that he wouldn’t have to die, not yet, not right now.

“What the hell are you doing?” demanded Scott, pulling Stiles up from the chair. “Why are you just sitting there? Come on!”

Pulling Stiles’ arm around him, Scott practically dragged him to the gaping hole that used to be the window.

“Hold on tight,” he told Stiles, and then Scott was swinging out and scaling the wall with one arm, the other arm around Stiles’ waist. He was only halfway down before he jumped to the ground, rolling so that he bore the impact rather than Stiles. Scott grunted and quickly pulled them both to their feet.

“Scott, fuck, Scott, you saved me,” Stiles gasped between coughs, still gripping Scott’s shoulders like a lifeline.

Scott grinned at him even as he patted Stiles down. “I have my good points sometimes. Are you alright? Are you hurt anywhere?”

Stiles was shaking, trembling so hard he could barely form coherent words. “Yeah, I— If you were just a little later— Fuck, almost died. Are the others— Was that Derek?”

“Yeah, he’s inside, cleaning house with Allison’s dad and our packs. He’s pretty mad. If you’re okay, we need to take you to the car, and I need to go back to help them,” Scott said urgently. “Were you the one who started the fire? Stiles, you’re crazy, you could have died!”

Stiles tried to say yes, that was the point, before he realized it probably wasn’t a great idea to say that to Scott. And then he remembered.

Plan B.

He was coughing more now, and through the adrenaline, he realized he was very nauseated. His stomach roiled as he tried to talk. “Scott, I had a plan, they were going to torture me—”

He broke off to cough harder, lungs aching as he tried to take in deeper breaths. Scott rubbed his back and told him to save his voice for later, he could explain later, it was alright now. But it wasn’t alright, and Stiles didn’t have time to save his breath.

Stiles clenched his hands in Scott’s Henley and rasped out, “They wanted to make an army. Wanted to know how— _Kanimas_. I couldn’t— I was afraid I would tell them. So the fire. And I— I—”

Scott and Stiles had been best friends long enough for Scott to read between the lines. His dark eyes widened as he gripped Stiles’ arms. “What have you done? Stiles, _what have you done_?”

Stiles shook in his grip. “Rat poison. A whole box. I need— Hospital.”

Then he doubled over and threw up. Scott’s poor shoes were splattered by his vomit, and Stiles felt guilty in a delirious, horrified way. He continued throwing up, retching up breakfast and bile until his stomach ached. Scott didn’t wait for him to say anything else. The moment he stopped gagging, Scott pulled Stiles’ arm around him again and started jogging, with Stiles stumbling after. His vision was hazy at the edges and his mind felt like it was spinning. He was obviously losing time, because the next moment, he was being pushed into the passenger seat of Mrs. McCall’s car and someone was yelling his name. He blinked and there was silence. And he blinked again, and Scott was yelling at him while driving like a maniac beside him.

“Stiles, stay awake! You have to stay awake!” Scott shouted.

Stiles felt like he was floating in a haze of pain and exhaustion. He didn’t even know where he hurt, it just felt like everywhere. Even _breathing_ hurt. But he had things he needed to say, just in case.

“Tell my dad— Everything. Tell him. I did it... Keep everyone safe. Take care of him,” he said in a rasp, hoping that he was making sense, because his thoughts didn’t make any sense, and he couldn’t feel his lips.

Scott growled, “You tell him yourself, damnit!”

Stiles’ head lolled against the seat, his eyes closing. “I’m sorry… Tell everyone I’m sorry. Tell Derek—”

Everything slipped away.

# # # # # # # # # #

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Threats of torture, beatings, suicide attempt


	2. Chapter 2

He woke up in stages. For awhile, all that existed was his aching, weary body before conscious thought stirred. His eyes felt tired, just like the rest of him, but he forced them open to see the blurry white ceiling and walls.

He was alive.

A few deep breaths later, and he felt a growing, almost overwhelming sense of relief encompass his body. He was _alive_. He didn’t die, and he was in a hospital now, which meant he was safe, he didn’t have the weight of everyone’s lives resting on his shoulders anymore. Once the shaky feeling had passed, he could catalogue his injuries in detail. His chest and sides hurt, and so did his legs strangely enough, but more importantly, he realized that his hand was being held in a very tight grip.

Stiles turned his head to see the top of his dad’s head, bowed over Stiles’ hand. He felt his breath stutter in regret, understanding how hard this must be on his dad.

“Dad,” he said, his voice coming out in a surprising croak. “Dad, I’m okay.”

His dad wiped his face with one hand before looking up, his eyes red-rimmed and wet. “Stiles, you’re lying in a hospital bed. You’re _not_ okay.”

Right, not his best conversation opener ever. “But I will be.” Then he realized that he didn’t really know that, because _rat poison_. “Right?”

His dad looked haggard and he rubbed his face again, but he nodded. The relief returned. Stiles tried to speak and started coughing instead.

Before he could ask, his dad was leaning over and grabbing a plastic cup with a straw in it. Stiles propped himself up a little and drank the cool water with desperate relish, feeling it soothe his aching throat and dry lips. He noticed that his dad still kept one hand on his. When he was done with half the cup, his dad took it away again. They stared at each other. Stiles just felt so damn happy that he was still alive, able to look at his dad, to explain everything to him.

Stiles said, “I didn’t, this wasn’t— Do you know what happened?”

“Scott told me everything,” his dad said.

Right, Stiles remembered that now, fragmented pieces of his babbling to Scott. “ _Everything_ everything? Grrrr, and all?”

With his raspy voice, the ‘grrrr’ sounded more like an angry kitten than a werewolf, but maybe his clawed hand scratching at the air got his message across because his dad nodded. “Everything. When I asked why my son was suffering from smoke inhalation and rat poison, I didn’t expect the explanation to involve werewolves.”

Wow, after all that time hiding everything, it felt strange to look his father in the eye and know that there were no more secrets. Stiles expected to feel relief or fear, but he was still in a strange, suspended limbo from his near-death experience and everything felt a little distant.

“Poor Scott,” Stiles mumbled. “He did the heavy lifting with this one.”

His dad’s grip tightened. “Trying to kill yourself wasn’t heavy lifting enough?”

Stiles jerked at the blunt words. He stared at his dad, mouth dropping open while he tried to find the right words to start explaining. His dad made a pained sound and shifted closer, curling his other hand over Stiles’ head. He rubbed the closely-shaven hair, mouth pinched in a mess of so many emotions that Stiles couldn’t read him.

“Scott could only guess why you did what you did,” his dad said, an unspoken plea for an explanation.

Stiles took a deep breath and tried to explain his reasoning. “If those werewolves, the ones who took me, if they had gotten the information they wanted from me… Dad, they would have killed so many people. Derek, Scott, Allison, everyone. And you, dad, they wouldn’t let you live if you were looking into my disappearance. And they would have made me disappear, after they had gotten everything they wanted from me anyway, so I couldn’t let them, I couldn’t—”

He didn’t know if it made sense, his words just tumbling out with an urgent need to make his dad understand that he didn’t do it to escape, that he did it for everyone. His relief from earlier, from finding out that he was still alive, was burning away in the face of what he had tried to do, leaving only a growing panic as his heart sped up.

Stiles’ dad let go of his hand to hug him instead. It was awkward, because Stiles was still lying flat on the bed, but he pushed himself up a little and tried to wrap his arms around his dad as best as he could. Stiles buried his face in his dad’s shoulder, croaking, “I didn’t want to. You have to believe me. I was so afraid, but I had to.”

“Okay, I believe you, son,” his dad whispered back, and Stiles felt wetness against his neck.

They held each other for a moment longer before his dad let him go, shifting him back on the bed to lie down in a better position again. His dad wiped his eyes unashamedly, because Stilinski men weren’t afraid to show their feelings, and Stiles rubbed his wet eyes against the pillowcase as well.

His dad placed a hand on Stiles’ shoulder. “I love you, son. And I see why you thought you had to— I understand. But I can’t lose you. I _can’t_ lose you too.”

“Dad…” Stiles’ voice cracked. “I know.”

“I was thinking— I was thinking maybe we could move, somewhere quieter,” his dad said, almost desperately. And it broke his heart to see his dad look so tired, face wrinkled and pale as he stared at Stiles like he would disappear at any moment. It was almost enough to say yes, yes to anything his dad wanted.

But that wasn’t his life anymore.

Stiles shook his head. “Dad, I can’t. It’s… It’s _Scott_ , and everyone. And even if we move, and ignore it, doesn’t mean these things would stop happening. I can’t ignore it. I can’t just leave my friends.”

His dad was shaking his head. “You almost _died_ , Stiles. You almost succeeded— Just to keep us safe. You shouldn’t have to make this sort of choices.”

Squeezing his dad’s hand, Stiles said quietly, “It’s like what you do every time you go to work.”

His dad’s eyes widened. “It’s not the same. I don’t try to kill myself to—”

“But you stand between civilians and danger,” Stiles cut in. “You face killers and crazy people with guns, and you risk your life to keep the town safe. Dad, it might not be as— as deliberate. As what I did. But it’s for the same reason, don’t you see? It’s the same thing.”

“It’s not, Christ, it’s not—” His dad’s voice was shaking, trying to deny what Stiles was saying, but visibly struggling. “You’re so young, Stiles. You’re too young, you’re seventeen, you shouldn’t have to.”

“I’ll be eighteen in a month. People go to war at this age,” Stiles said, his voice gentle, because he understood what his dad was saying. For a long time now, he had often thought they were too young to be doing this, at sixteen, at seventeen. But he rarely thought of it like that anymore. This was his life now.

His dad’s mouth turned down. “Is that what this is? War?”

Stiles shook his head. “No, not— not all the time. Just sometimes. Like today. But it’s not like that every day.”

They sat in silence for a moment, both winded from the difficult, emotional conversation.

His dad broke the silence with a sigh. “So you don’t want to move, and from what you’re saying, you’re going to continue... Being involved in this werewolf business.”

“Sometimes, we get kanimas and selkies and rogue hunters too,” Stiles said, before continuing at his dad’s unimpressed look. “But yes. I’m going to continue with all that.”

“Then you’re going to tell me everything,” his dad said. “ _Everything_. No more secrets. And I don’t want to be left out of anything just because you want to protect me. I’m the Sheriff in case you didn’t notice, I can do the protecting too.”

Ah, so Scott had told his dad his reason for the secrets too. This would make things harder in the future, because his dad was the sheriff, and he was awesome, but these were monsters, which wasn’t like the average criminal his dad would be used to dealing with…

His dad curved his hand around Stiles’ head and shook it a little. “No plotting. If you want to do this, then you’re going to tell me everything. Otherwise I’m going to be arresting Derek at every opportunity so that he’ll have to share the information instead.”

Stiles winced, because Derek wasn’t likely to share any information even if he was arrested, but he would be pissed. “Alright, yes, okay. I was just taking a moment for a mental adjustment, give me a break.”

His dad glared. “Good. And you’re going to be better prepared to cope with this sort of situations.”

Stiles blinked up at him hazily. “What do you mean?”

“I’m going to get a handgun and transfer ownership to you when you turn eighteen. And you’re going to get yourself a shotgun,” his dad said. “Then we’re going to brush up on your marksmanship.”

Stiles gaped at his dad for a moment, before smiling. “Wow, dad, suddenly you’re all cool and everything.”

His dad shook his head. “I have always been cool.”

“Yeah, you keep telling yourself that,” Stiles said, before picking at his blanket. “You know, I’m thinking of being a cop. Follow in my old man’s footsteps. So I’ll have lots of training there.”

His dad said, “You said that when you were a kid, but you’re not just doing it now because you think it will help with your… extracurricular activities, do you?”

Stiles explained, a stream of words pouring out in his still scratchy voice, “It’s not like I never thought about it before all this werewolfy stuff started happening. It seems like a pretty logical progression after everything, at least I know how to deal with the supernatural too. I’m also pretty good at poking my nose into places people don’t want me to, so I think I would make a pretty good detective.”

His dad stared at him for a moment, before sighing and patting his head. “I think I raised too good a son.”

“Should have raised a lazy, uncaring layabout instead,” Stiles said with a smirk.

“Yeah, sometimes, I think that would have been easier.”

They both ignored the insincerity in his dad’s voice and the hint of pride in his eyes. Stiles knew that this wouldn’t be the last conversation he would have with his dad about his safety and involvement in such dangerous situations. But it was a start.

# # # # # # # # # #

His dad stayed with him for two hours, before Stiles pestered him to get some rest on a proper bed. He agreed to go home to shower and catch a couple hours of sleep, ceding his chair to Scott instead. But Scott ignored the chair and climbed into bed with Stiles, sleeping on top of the blankets but curling up against Stiles.

“You should have waited,” said Scott, voice rising in pitch. “Didn’t you think that we were coming?”

Stiles stared up at the ceiling, trying to avoid Scott’s gaze. “Don’t freak out on me, please, Scott, buddy. I had a rough talk with my dad, I’m tired, and I need— I need to calm down a little.”

They both lay there in silence for a minute, before Stiles felt Scott relax into the bed.

“Just so you know, I’m going to freak out later,” Scott stated, sounding a little grumpy. Thank God Scott was a softie.

“You’re the best, dude,” said Stiles with a small grin. “Could we go over some things I missed instead? Like, how did you even know they had taken me?”

Scott pressed up against him, shoulder-to-shoulder, before admitting reluctantly, “Derek did. He went to your place to keep arguing I guess, and when you didn’t turn up after an hour, he called me. I knew you should have gone home already, because you said you went to get groceries and you wouldn’t drive around town with groceries in your Jeep.”

“Thank God for paranoid Alpha instincts,” Stiles said with a quirk of his lips, a very light expression of his sincere gratitude. Scott would get it. “How did you find me then?”

“We had to track you from the grocery store, which was pretty hard, because cars are always harder to track. We were near where you were being held when we smelled smoke. And where there’s smoke, there’s fire. Where there’s fire, there’s Stiles.”

Stiles nudged him with an elbow. “Hey. One mishap in Chem shouldn’t follow me for life.”

“The whole table was on fire,” Scott said, with a trace of awe even after all these years. “Harris’ face was so _red_ we thought he was going to explode into flames too.”

They both snickered over the memory, Stiles a little more breathlessly than Scott.

Finally, Stiles sighed, switching back to the original topic, “Then I guess you all came charging in like heroes to save the helpless human again.”

“The helpless human managed to set fire to the Alpha, making her an easy kill for Derek,” Scott said wryly.

“Woah, so she did collide with the werewolf that was on fire. That was good luck.” Stiles gave himself a mental fist bump.

Scott turned on his side and poked Stiles in the stomach. Stiles twitched and complained, “You’re supposed to cater to the patient’s every whim, not harass him.”

When he turned to look at Scott, he realized the light moment had passed. Scott was no longer smiling, only staring at him with unusual intensity.

“Did your dad tell you that breathing in the smoke made you vomit most of the rat poison?” Scott asked, watching him with dark, serious eyes. “They pumped your stomach anyway and gave you something to absorb the poison.”

Hearing what they had to do to save him was a sobering moment. Stiles winced, making a face.

He said in a quiet, subdued voice, “Thanks for saving my life, buddy.”

Scott frowned. “Don’t do that to me again.”

Stiles kept quiet, but shifted a little closer. Scott curled an arm around his waist, just like when they were kids and still had sleepovers, before they both decided they were too old for cuddling. Looked like werewolves were never too old for cuddling. The conversation petered out along with what little there was left of Stiles’ energy.

Stiles gave in to his heavy eyelids’ demands and let them fall close. Before he drifted off to sleep, he heard, “You owe me a new pair of shoes, dude. No way I’m washing your puke off them.”

His lips turned up as he fell asleep.

# # # # # # # # # #

Stiles woke up in the early hours of the morning to push Scott away, feeling overheated. He remembered waking up drowsily a few times in the night to see his friends checking that he was fine with their own eyes. Danny, Allison and Lydia must have been snuck in by Scott’s mum since it was after visiting hours. The other werewolves came at various times, all climbing in through the window. He was sure that he slept through a few visits, since he only saw Isaac and Boyd. Derek’s newer pack members might not have come, since Stiles wasn’t as close to them, but Erica wouldn’t have missed the opportunity to take pictures of Stiles in a hospital bed.

And Derek. They might only be fuck buddies, but they were still friends. Of a sort. Derek would have come visit.

“Mmmphh, you’re thinking too loud,” Scott grumbled.

Stiles sighed. “Sorry. Just… Did Derek visit last night?”

“Yeah,” Scott mumbled, eyes still closed. “Stood like a creeper over the bed but you were sleepin’.”

“Dude, he’s not going to be happy that we’re sharing a bed again,” Stiles said, because no matter how casual the thing was with Derek, it was still a problem when Stiles carried someone else’s scent. It made being in a different pack quite interesting.

“He was already annoyed last night. Tried to make me leave, but I said you were in _my_ pack,” Scott said, finally opening his eyes to glare at Stiles like Stiles was the one who had complained.

 “Yes, I am, you moron,” Stiles said, rolling his eyes. “But he’s my sex buddy. And when I smell too much like you, it offends his sensibilities and affects his ability to get it up.”

He expected Scott to moan about ‘TMI’, like he had done the past few times, but Scott just huffed. “Yeah, so he says.”

Stiles blinked. “What?”

Scott sighed and snuggled into this shoulder. “Never mind. I should go get breakfast.”

“You won’t find breakfast in my shoulder, dude,” grumbled Stiles.

After a few more minutes of enforced cuddling, Scott finally rolled out of the bed. He stretched and yawned, rubbing a hand through his hair. “Are you up for visitors?”

Even though he had his suspicions, Stiles still asked, “Who’s here?”

Scott shot Stiles a knowing look. “Derek’s outside. He’s been here the whole night.”

Stiles gaped at him before shaking his head. “You really like to torture him, don’t you?”

“Yep,” Scott said with a goofy grin.

“Ugh, he’s going to be so grumpy. Anyway, give me ten minutes. I need to pee like crazy,” Stiles said, heaving himself out of bed like an old man.

Scott hovered beside him every step of the way, and embarrassingly, waited outside the enjoined bathroom for Stiles to pee and brush his teeth. The mollycoddling was comforting and irritating at the same time, especially since Scott did the same song and dance when Stiles went to the bathroom last night, and had already seen that Stiles could manage on his own.

By the time Stiles rolled back into bed, he felt exhausted, even though he had barely moved. And hungry; he would have demanded for food first, but Derek was probably scaring away all the patients and nurses with his death glares, so Stiles should probably see him now. He waved Scott out feebly.

Surprising no one, Derek came in less than a minute later, stopping right next to the bed and looming over Stiles.

Stiles stared at him, because Derek was a mess. He was wearing a loose cotton T-shirt that looked wrinkled and slept-in, and his spiky hair was half-flattened and disheveled. His face was pale, and his eyes shadowed, even though Stiles had seen him only a day ago, and he looked fine then.

“Dude, you look terrible,” Stiles blurted out, half-horrified.

Derek just kept on staring, his eyes wide and roaming over Stiles’ face and body. Then he said in a hoarse voice, as if he suffered from smoke inhalation too and his werewolf healing abilities had stopped working, “Can I— Can I just—”

But that seemed to be the extent of his ability to talk, because he lapsed into a broken silence.

“Can you what?” Stiles cleared his throat, nervous at this strange behavior, and his own still raspy voice made him wince. “I’m usually good at Derek to normal English translations, but I need something more to work with.”

Derek seemed to give up on words completely, at that point, just moving jerkily in frustration. He sat down abruptly on the bed, nudging Stiles with his knees until Stiles shifted over. Then Derek lifted the blankets, lay down and rolled Stiles over onto his side. Limbs flailed before they were caught and adjusted until Stiles was tucked against Derek, back to ever-toasty front. Derek tucked his nose against the back of Stiles’ ear and breathed in a deep, jagged breath.

They lay like this for a few minutes, quiet. Derek’s arm was tight around his middle, almost uncomfortably so.

“I didn’t— It wasn’t because I wanted to,” Stiles said, because maybe Derek didn’t know, maybe no one told him and this was guilt or something.

Except Derek said against his neck, voice muffled, “I heard what you said to your dad.”

Stiles grunted in annoyance. “Rude. You’re not supposed to eavesdrop.”

“You had almost _died_ , Stiles,” Derek breathed, voice pained. “I couldn’t _not_ listen in, just to make sure you were— you’re alright.”

He supposed it was a pretty extenuating situation. “Okay, well… Don’t do it again.” Because there had to be ground rules. Even if sometimes, it felt like all they had were ground rules.

Derek snapped, “Then you don’t do it again.”

“What are you talking about?” Then Stiles realized exactly what Derek was talking about, and he wriggled in Derek’s tight hold, shifted until he was lying on his other side and facing Derek instead.

Those ridiculous hazel eyes were so close, but for once, Stiles wasn’t captivated by their strange color or by Derek’s long, spiky lashes. He was too taken aback by the haunted look in Derek’s eyes, by how large they seemed in his pale face, and how tightly those thick eyebrows were drawn together like his face couldn’t relax anymore.

Stiles pressed a thumb to Derek’s frown, trying to smoothen it away, before he realized what an intimate gesture that was. It was a funny thought to have, that this was too intimate, when he and Derek had been fucking for six months now. Stiles dropped his hand and tried to joke away the tense moment, tired of the non-stop intensity since he woke up in the hospital, “I’m obviously too much of a klutz to get a little poisoning right. I don’t think I would do better a second time round.”

Derek’s eyes widened and his hands tightened on Stiles’ hips. “Don’t. Just _don’t_.”

Stiles winced. Alright, that was a pretty stupid thing to say when Derek was distraught, even though he didn’t expect Derek to be so visibly upset.

“Sorry,” he murmured, then accepted that he would have to talk about this. “You know why I did it. You should understand better than my dad. I didn’t want to, but I _had_ to.”

Derek shook his head and drew Stiles closer. They were almost nose-to-nose, practically breathing the same air. “You can’t do that again.”

They watched each other in silence for a moment, before Stiles whispered, “It wasn’t your fault.”

But Derek didn’t acknowledge that, only demanded in a low and desperate tone, “You have to promise.”

“I can’t,” Stiles sighed.

“No, Stiles, you can’t do that again,” Derek said, voice urgent and hands tight around Stiles’ waist. “You have to know that we’ll always come for you. We’ll always come for you no matter what, and you have to wait. Please wait.”

The please near broke Stiles’ heart. He pressed his lips together tight to keep from blurting out useless promises. Then he said carefully, slow in his honesty, “I don’t know if I can. I can’t hold up against torture. They wanted to— There were things they wanted to do that I can’t, I know I can’t hold up against.”

“Then you tell them. Then you give them what they want,” Derek said, urgently, as if Stiles was there right now, being pushed by some faceless villain and Derek could keep him safe by making him spill everything, risk everyone else instead.

Stiles shook his head. “Then I would be dead anyway. The moment I gave them what they wanted, I would have been useless to them, and they’d have killed me anyway. Better that I— It’s better that I did it my way.”

Derek said hoarsely, voice rasping like he was the one trapped in a burning room and had swallowed poison, “Then you need to hold out. I know, I know it’s selfish asking for this, but you need to wait. You can’t give up on us. If anything like this happens— We’ll come for you, and you need to hold out against… everything. Because I can’t, we can’t go through that, Stiles. We _can’t_.”

Stiles trembled at the force of Derek’s plea, his heart jittering at the unexpected desperation he was seeing, shivering at what Derek was asking of him.

“Promise you will wait if you ever, if this ever happens again,” Derek demanded in a rough whisper.

“Okay, alright, I promise,” Stiles said, not wanting to know if his heartbeat tripped with a lie or held steady with an unfathomable truth. Stiles didn’t know, he couldn’t begin to guess himself if he was making a promise he thought he could keep or just saying anything to make Derek’s pain and fear go away.

He leaned in and pressed a kiss to Derek’s mouth, felt the tremors running through the arms that curled around him in response. They kissed desperately, a mess of shallow kisses and harsh breathing.

Eventually, Stiles tucked Derek’s face into the crook of his neck, running his hand through Derek’s hair. It was a strange reversal of roles, and not what he had expected at all when Derek came in.

There were a lot of things, things to do with _feelings_ , that Stiles had been trying to ignore, but he couldn’t continue pretending anymore. Not with the way Derek was holding him so tightly, not with the urgent, desperate demands he made.

“This isn’t casual, is it?” Stiles asked, almost more a statement of fact than question.

Derek said, quiet and honest, “I don’t know how to do casual with you.”

Stiles huffed, but he didn’t stop stroking Derek’s hair. “You asshole. When were you going to tell me?”

“I didn’t know if it was the same for you. I was waiting for you to tell me what you wanted.”

Derek was too experienced at just waiting through all kinds of suffering, with no certainty that it would eventually relent. It explained a little about what Derek had asked of him. Maybe Stiles could learn to do the same; hold on and wait and believe, because someone was always going to come for him. If he was going through hell, just keep going. 

It was probably delusional, but Stiles would have to try for Derek and his dad. For everyone, really.

“It’s not casual to me either,” Stiles whispered, his heart beating steadily.

Derek moved up and kissed him, deep and satisfied, hands curled around Stiles’ face like he was precious and fragile. Stiles wrapped his arms around Derek’s shoulders, holding on just as tightly and knowing he wouldn’t be letting go of this, not without a fight. 

**THE END**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. I have a theory that Gerard beat Stiles as a two birds, one stone deal. He wanted confirmation of Derek’s hideout location (where they brought the kanima to at the end), and he wanted to send a message to Scott in the form of a beaten Stiles. 
> 
> 2\. At the hospital, they gave Stiles activated charcoal to absorb the poison. It’s given to victims of most poisoning cases.
> 
> This story is a little unusual for me and getting through the emotional bits was really hard, so let me know how you found it. :O
> 
> Aaaaaand [here's a little gif](http://awesomelifechoices.tumblr.com/post/38052152103/fic-back-up-plan-most-of-everyone-knew-who-to) I made to go with this fic, posted on my tumblr awesomelifechoices. The inspiration for this story came from these images, when I rewatched Teen Wolf.


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